Many projects have been subject to development hell over the years, whether over production delays, creative differences, or a whole myriad of obstacles and setbacks; Jeremy Renner's biopic on Doc Holliday is no different, having failed to materialize since it was announced that the Hawkeye actor would star as the infamous gunslinger back in 2017. Though there was plenty of online buzz and chatter at the time surrounding the project, its future remains unclear eight years later, especially following Renner's snow plow accident back in 2023.

Given all that's known about the real Doc Holliday, there's plenty of directions a potential movie focused on the Western figure could go. The number of movies that feature Doc Holiday is evidence of that. Yet, the opportunity for a great Doc Holiday movie with Jeremy Renner was never seized upon, leaving the project in limbo for years.

Jeremy Renner's Planned Doc Holliday Movie Explained

The Film Would've Shown A Lot Of Holliday's Life Before Tombstone, AZ

When Jeremy Renner's Doc Holliday project was announced back in 2017, it was reported that the film would be based off of author Mary Doria Russell's two novels surrounding the life of the famed gunslinger: Doc and Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral. Unlike other movies like Wyatt Earp and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, however, the Renner-led biopic would provide an intimate glimpse into Holliday's earlier life as a Georgian dentist and the tragic path that would lead him to the showdown in Tombstone, Arizona, including his years gambling and eventual diagnosis and battle with tuberculosis.

The first cinematic depiction of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral was in the 1932 film Law and Order from 1932, which changed the names of Wyatt Earp to "Frame Johnson" and Doc Holliday to "Ed Brandt."

Along these lines, Renner's Holliday biopic was gearing up to be more of a character study than an action western, akin to films like Dances with Wolves and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Despite this emphasis on the gunslinger's earliest years, however, it's highly unlikely that the infamous gunfight at the O.K. Corral would be absent from the film's climax, as any serious biopic on Holliday would be remiss not to feature his role in the showdown, which has been portrayed and immortalized in countless westerns for nearly a century.

Why Hasn't Jeremy Renner's Doc Holliday Movie Happened?

The Answer's More Complicated Than You Think

Despite generating a hefty amount of online buzz and anticipation for Jeremy Renner's take on the western legend, the Holliday biopic has failed to gain significant traction over the past eight years, emphasized by a telling lack of any major updates on the project since its announcement nearly a decade ago. Of course, there are a multitude of factors responsible for the film's stalled development, most notably the COVID-19 pandemic and Renner's brush with death in 2023 that brought the actor's career to a screeching halt and placed him on a long and thankfully successful recovery process.

However, another factor that's likely contributed to the film's delayed production is the subpar performance of westerns at the box office recently, with movies like Clint Eastwood's Cry Macho and Kevin Costner's Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 failing to initially turn a profit. Furthermore, the demand for western narratives has largely shifted from film to television over the past five years, signified best by the recent success of Taylor Sheridan's Yellowstone franchise and spinoffs 1883 and 1923.

Though there's been no confirmation on this next point, perhaps the quickest route for Renner's Holliday biopic to escape its nearly decade-long postponement is to restructure its narrative into a comprehensive miniseries that immortalizes the gunslinger's nuanced and turbulent life.

It May Be For The Best That Renner's Doc Holliday Movie Didn't Happen

Development Hell Could Be A Blessing In Disguise

Though it's unfortunate that we might realistically never get to see Jeremy Renner's take on the infamous Doc Holliday, it might prove to be truly for the best in the long run, especially following the news of Val Kilmer's recent death in April. Indeed, the late Top Gun actor delivered what many consider to be the definitive performance of Holliday in 1993's Tombstone, outshining the likes of Kurt Russell, Bill Paxton, and other western film legends like Billy Bob Thornton and Sam Elliot with his colorful interpretation of the charming and sophisticated gunslinger.

Given this recent development, it almost seems appropriate for Jeremy Renner's Doc Holliday biopic to find closure in its current limbo—not due to any failure on Renner's part, but out of reverence and respect for Kilmer's iconic portrayal, much like how sports franchises retire the numbers of famed legends like Lou Gehrig and Jackie Robinson. At the end of the day, a cinematic venture of this scale is a tall, tall feat, and as much as I love it when an actor takes a big, daunting swing, given Kilmer's recent ing, any miss—even if only mediocre—would likely leave a poor taste in the mouth.

However, that's not to say we shouldn't welcome the attempt if it eventually arises; if the film does emerge from the throes of its prolonged stay in development hell, we'd all certainly benefit from wishing the filmmakers luck in their endeavors while cautiously hoping that their grasp can reach even the faintest glories of their dreams. Ultimately, whether Renner's biopic becomes a new American classic will only be revealed through time. The only thing I'm truly certain of is that we already got that classic back in 1993.